The Denmark international looks well-placed to fill the spot left by John Terry, but he will be unhappy with anything other than first-team football after two seasons playing in the Bundesliga where he's highly rated.

Goal sources say that "several players" could return as Victor Moses, Nathaniel Chalobah and, most recently, Nathan Ake all successfully moved from the loan programme to Chelsea's first team.

Chelsea qualfiied for the Champions League after beating Everton 3-0 at the weekend and they will need a bigger squad for Europe after selling Oscar, Branislav Ivanovic and John Obi Mikel in January.

Tammy Abraham has scored an outstanding 21 goals for Bristol City in his debut season as a senior professional footballer, which has many clubs interested in signing him either permanently and on loan.

Conte highly regards the youngster but discussions around how much game-time he will get at Stamford Bridge will be had in the summer and he looks set for a new deal.

As well as Abraham, there are high hopes at Stamford Bridge for some of the younger loanees like of Izzy Brown, Matt Miazga, Jeremie Boga and Lewis Baker, all of whom are in contention for a return.

Two or three of them may get their chance to impress on pre-season, but they will have to go through summer meetings to decide their futures as is protocol with all the club's loanees.

Many of the teenage loanees expecting to spend another season away include the likes of Kasey Palmer, Fikayo Tomori and Jay Dasilva.

Chelsea are expected to cash in on Fulham duo Lucas Piazon and Tomas Kalas, Loic Remy will be sold after a disappointing season at Crystal Palace, and Baba Rahman could also depart with several clubs from Italy, Germany and England all keen to snap him up.

However, most of the Blues' players who are away on temporary moves won't yet have had their futures decided and some of the deals could be thrashed out as late as August 31.

The Chelsea loan army will be boosted by yet more Under-18 players going out on loan next season from their FA Youth Cup winning team. Chelsea will continue to look to sign young, bargain players that could increase in value, such as Jeremy Toljan, and then loan them out.